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Sunday, March 27, 2011

Sacrifice

March 27, 2011 at 6:17pm

I just can't help but feel a little sad that the girls and I came home and had to leave Chaz behind. It is the first time we have left him. For all these years, he has been on the leaving end. It is so weird to be on this end.
For off and on for 12 years now, I have packed him up and sent him all over the world. He has been to more places internationally then I think I will ever get a chance to go. The girls and I are very comfortable with him leaving. It has become normal to have him for a little bit and then only have him via phone and internet. Don't get me wrong we still miss him like crazy, but I made my peace with his job a long time ago. When he deployed to Afghanistan, Deryn didn't even cry, what does that tell you?!
When I met Chaz he said he always wanted to be a soldier and serve his country. I knew going into this relationship that I would have to give him up to his job. The funny thing is when he joined the Army the biggest threat we had was a 6 month peacekeeping mission to the Balkan areas. Then some men changed all of our lives when they decided to fly planes into buildings. As we approach the 10th anniversary of 9-11 it's interesting to see the ramifications of those acts still fail like dominos. And now one of those dominos has struck the Allen household. I have full faith that our leaders know what they are doing, but as I leave my husband in a hospital to heal from an IED I can't help but question some of those decisions. These are the moments I thank God for giving me faith in Him and know that everything will be ok. I want to know how people survive this without faith, hope and love.
And then there's the girls. Our two beautiful girls have grown up with nothing but terror threats and war. I banned the news from our home back in 2006 when the news reported that Chaz's entire company had been killed in Iraq. After allowing them to control my mind and convince me I was a widow, I hit the power button and now only watch the news for the weather. I can't stand the thought of raising our girls in a world of fear. The world is a great place full of exciting opportunities. Our girls need to be aware of the world, but not afraid. This is why we have simply told them that Chaz stepped on an explosion. We do not want them to hate the people of Afghanistan. That is unfair to both our girls and the people of that country. We do not hate the people of Afghanistan. We actually don't hate anyone. We have told the girls that this is God's plan for us and we must have faith in that plan. There's no time for hate in our family. First hate takes up too much time. Hate is an ignorant emotion. If you truly look you will see you only hate something because you don't understand it. We can sit and hate but why. It will not solve a thing. Hate simply creates more hate and who wants to live in that kind of world, not us! And that's not a world to raise children in either.
I also have to laugh at God's sense of humor. I have prayed so many times for Chaz to be ours for good. This is totally not what I had in mind. But I will take it, because I still have him. He may have lost 2 legs, has a broken elbow and a ton of scars, but he's still our Chaz. God saved the most important parts, his heart, his brain and his personality. Since he spared these pieces I knew from our first phone call that everything would be ok. Seeing him for the first time and seeing that smile simply proved that fact. Chaz is one amazing person and together we can conquer anything! I am just so thankfuil that within 8 short weeks our little family will be together forever. I know the easy thing is to pack them up and move them to DC, but Chaz still has a big surgery to conquer and I stand by the fact that hospitals are not the place for children. The girls proved to us this week that we made the right decision by leaving them in TN. Kids are kids. They want to play and have fun. Walter Reed has done an excellent job of thinking about the kids, but the kids still get stir crazy. So we will continue on with our plan.
Please continue to pray for our family. Please especially pray for the elbow surgery coming up. We want Chaz to have as much success as possible. God is listening, please lift us up.
=) Jessica